New study says it is smarter to renovate existing buildings such as our Dearborn City Hall rather than lionizing fancy new 'green' construction.

It has been interesting to read some of the comments about whether Dearborn should look for a new City Hall rather than repairing the 90-year-old historic building that our city government operates in today.

We still believe making repairs and the necessary updates to the building is money better spent than packing up and spending money to buy a newer building and then spending more to make it suitable for city government offices.

Architecturally, our City Hall is one of the nicest looking buildings in East Dearborn and it deserves to be preserved and updated, just as you would do with a classic automobile.

Which brings us to a recent article we ran across recently in Time magazine. In that article, the magazine reports that making existing buildings “green” is actually a better strategy than constructing a new building.

“Revaluing building reuse is not just an environmental issue, it’s an economic opportunity,” Elizabeth Hider, senior vice president of Green Markets for Skanska, an international construction firm quoted in the article. “One that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil and one that creates American jobs. Because renovation projects use less material, it is good for the environment, but it requires more labor, which has to be local. That’s good for America.”

You can read the full article HERE.